Over the last decade or so, access points were provisioned by network service providers. In particular, according to a first conventional deployment scenario, network device manufacturers/vendors are responsible for providing access points to a network service provider. The network service provider provisions the access points for a particular customer by configuring each access point with particular settings desired by the customer (e.g. encryption type, power levels, name, etc.). Thereafter, the access point is re-labeled and re-shipped to that customer for deployment. This provisioning scheme is costly and, in some cases, substantially delays deployment of needed wireless networking equipments.
Another conventional deployment scenario involves a corporation having a dedicated facility for configuring access points. Access points are sent from a network device manufacturer/vendor to the facility. After configuring at the facility, the access point intended for use by a remote employee of the corporation is sent from the facility for subsequent deployment by the employee. As before, this provisioning scheme is costly due to additional shipping and labor costs.
Yet another conventional deployment scenario involves a corporation re-shipping an “unprovisioned” access point received from a network device manufacturer/vendor to an employee along with instructions as to how to provision and configure the access point. This deployment scenario is costly from a loss of labor perspective as the employee is required to allocate time from work for such deployment.